Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1887-02-18

A special from Fort Keogh, Mont, says:
This has Teen the the most severe winter
here for years, From January to IL the
cod was something frightfuL Mercury
thermometers were often congealed, and
pirit Thermometers were busy jumI ing from
40 degrees to 60 degrees below zero. Half a
dozen times had the sixty note been touched
and once this season 90 degrees below zero
has been scored on the Saskatchewan plains.
Already this winter a number of deaths
| from cold have occurred in Dakota. Charles |
Schroeder, living near Valley Ci y, started
| from his house for one GOO feet distant. A
blizzard was blowing and the Thermometer
registered 35 below. Not reaching home
his family and neighbors turned
out with lanterns, followed his tracks
in the snow all night and found where he had
laid down in straw stack and then gone Oh.
The body was found twelve mi es away on
| the pra rie, lying on its face, where he had
fallen from exhaustion The body was fro~
zen into chunk of ice. Maggie Bum, a
| school teacher at Highmore, while going from
! the school to her house. was frozen to death.
| The bodi,s of three Indians were found fro
zen near Ashland whI belonged to the B4r-
! thold agency. Several more have been miss
sing since Christmas and they must have
been caught out. Their bodies will probably
be found when the snow melts in the spring
Stage drivers are having the toughest expe-
| riences Of their lives They are the heroes
of Montan0. The frightful experience of Fox
| and Montgomery on the Benton stage, bound
for Helena twenty days a %, will go down in
history as the worst Of the kind. They wero
| without food and drink for forty hours A
stage driver started February 4 from Fort
Buford for Glendove. When seventeen.
miles out the stage was caught III blizzard
and one of The horses frozen to death.
A lao o. re- r,,f fixvn lafR
Buford last week for the end of the track
grading, When they came to the crest Of
the hill the worst blizzard Of the season
! sprang up and they were compelled TO go
into camp on the spot, 1t was simply i'm
| possible to travel in any direction in such
storm. On that exposed knoll they passed
| from Friday to Monday without wood or
food. They finally escaped more dead than
alive. Tom Williams, a sheep herder near
| Mossgate Springs, about 60 years old, was
discovered, lying face downward, dead, in
the snow. A band Of British Cree indians
came across the line and camped in the
| mountains between the forks of the sun
river. An unusual snow followed, aid the
wretched creatures became penned in by an
! icy wall. From seventy the number was
reduced to fifty-one by starvation, when
white men hunted them up and brought
relief. A band of half-breeds is reported
covered up on Lonesome prairie, and q num-
|
| Chief JoSeph's famous band, who fought
Generals Miles and Howard so stubbornly,
| have been showed in on ColYille res ovation.
Four feet of snow prevented hunting game,
and many died Of cold and hunger.
During the latter part OF January fifty
| lodges OF Crow Indians, camped on Clark'S
fork, camo near diving. Many did perish,
/ but the majority managed to sustain life by
eating the cattle that died in the sHow
| drifts. 1t is almost impossible TO say what
| damage has occurred with stock and cattle.
| AS rule horses and mules have done well,
but clttle and sheep have been more than
| decimated. Some authorities say that the
sheep industry is nearly wiped out, eXcent
where shelter and food were provided 1t
| is hard to get news from remote ranges, as
the country is still b,ockaded and locomoton
| Is impossible except on snow shoes. Twelve
hundred out of 1900 sheep were lost in one
| locality, and the survivors We're SO badly
mutilated by coyotes and wolves that many
| died. Soma sheepmen in Western Montana
| have lost whole herds Long lines of cattle
| have BEEN drifting into the Missouri river,
and hereab bouts many hundreds have per-
| iShed in water holes, A man who has just
come in o Billings says he counted go head
of animals in the road in four days, and
does not know how many more in the bush.
Parties from tha Bull mountains report
numerous dead cattle Many are buried in
the snow. Another man counted forty five
! dead cattle. In the upper Missouri country
hay is worth $40 ton more than the face
value, and it does not pay to feed. Near
B 'nton some cattle were seen to stand in the
snow with freezing legs. Others were liter
ally frozen in their tracks Arounl Miles
City the outlook is the best of ALL Stockmel
are more hopeful there than elsewhere.
A fuel famine has been prevailing along
the upper Missouri At Fort Benton willow
poles are Sl7 to SIT 80 loa, and water
logged cottonwood Sl4 cord. One family
here used them to keep from freezing. Bars
and outbuildings have been consum d. A
blizzard was reported from Helena yesterday
morning, blowing eastward, twenty miles an
hour. Stockmen and ranchers were warned
to hurry the cattle and effects out of the
river bottoms. Advices just rec .ived say
that blizzard is raging just above Helena,
and that it is showing i'll that locality.